by Rabbi Bruce Ginsburg and Rabbi Ronald Price
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed here are that of the writer and do not necessarily represent the views of the Union for Traditional Judaism, unless otherwise indicated.
In their letter in The Forward, Rabbis Ronald Price and Bruce Ginsburg discuss the voice of the UTJ in the context of the development of female clergy in the Conservative and Orthodox movements.
Presciently, some among the UTCJ leadership asserted that – within an Orthodox setting where there are plenty of laymen capable of serving as prayer leaders, Torah readers and witnesses and where commitment to halachah would preclude infractions – women could serve in positions of spiritual leadership, even if it would mean developing a new title to reflect this welcome innovation. Far from inventing specious sociological arguments to block women’s leadership of the Jewish community, the founders of the UTCJ were the first to define the halachic parameters enabling women’s ordination that have now been adopted by Open Orthodoxy.
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Bruce Ginsburg is the Rabbi Emeritus of Congregation Sons of Israel in Woodmere, NY. A product of Boston University, New York’s Jewish Theological Seminary, and Jerusalem’s Hebrew University, he holds a doctorate in Hebrew literature. Known for his decades-old activism on behalf of Israel, Soviet Jewry, and intra/interfaith cooperation, he has served both as president of the Long Island Board of Rabbis and as president of the Union for Traditional Judaism. His essays have appeared in Newsday, the Christian Science Monitor, the Jerusalem Report, and other publications. He and his wife, Rachel, moved to Israel in the summer of 2022.